The Researchers
by birkinsmith-88
Summary: Latest Chapter (4): William's wife comes to the facilityand John can't see what all the fuss is about... until he sees her, of course! . R&R PLZ
1. Default Chapter

Disclaimer: All the names of the researchers I took from the S.D Perry books based on the game.  
  
Authors Notes: This is set before my story 'The Conspiracy' when the mansion lab was first commissioned. The main character (John) is meant to be the guy that ends up being Ada's B.F. With that out the way, lets begin.  
  
PS: I haven't very far in R.E. Zero, so I think I've messed William birkin's personality up a little bit, but I'll be sure to tone him down in the next chapter.  
  
****  
  
John collapsed on his new bed with a gasping moan in grimy exhaustion. God, he needed a shower and this bed was as lumpy as hell, the springs were poking through and sticking in his back even as he tried to rest up. He was defiantly going to have a shower, a pleasant scorching, cleansing shower. John closed his eyes and envisioned the beads of hot water rapidly striking his face and closed eyelids, warm water sensuously running down his cheeks. He opened his mouth and swore he could almost taste the warm water.  
  
John worked at and ran one of the big time Umbrella pharmacies in the suburbs of Raccoon City with great satisfaction and he had a right to! It was the best damn pharmacy in town! John had studied like mad and to be honest wasn't too pleased with the where he got. His friends (or employees) told him not to be to greedy, to be pleased with his lot in life but he never was, so you can guess how elated he was when a job offer came through from Umbrella H.Q to work at a newly commissioned laboratory. At last he had been recognised for his talents! Though the trip wasn't far, having to find the damn facility in the middle of Raccoon forest was what drained him. Apparently the labs were under a supposedly 'abandoned mansion' in the middle of the forest but when John walked in the door for the first time, it looked anything but abandoned. The place was a grand building indeed; it took his breath away to think that the company had spent so much on making this mansion when it was just basically a disguise for the labs. It was furnished with exquisitely haunting gothic design, each of Johns meek footsteps echoed in the vast majesty.  
  
He room, however, wasn't so enchanting. It was squalid and plane and the room was tinted in the most disgusting shade, as though the walls has been painted in a hue John had dubbed 'heavy smokers cream'; his Dad smoked a lot when he was a kid and the once white walls had become that exact same shade. It was like a badly furnished prison cell, it didn't even have a single window and the toilet was in a shocking condition; all these revolting streaks of discoloured brown. What the hell happened to this room before he got it???  
  
The shower was in slightly better condition, the only bad point being that it looked like something out of the 1930's and the curtains were green and white stripes. but at least he didn't find a huge turd in there like he first feared after seeing the toilet.  
  
John was very glad he brought his own towels when he looked in the closet; the few items that were in there were old clothes that looked like they'd be at home in the 60's. You'd have to be colour blind to even consider wearing them, though that wasn't the most worrying thing about that closet.. When he opened it he got the faint aroma of urine.  
  
Making sure the bed was clean and insect free before he put his clothes on it, John took the time to lock the door before jumping in the shower. It hissed and gargled for some seconds before splurging out rusty water and then finally coming to a steady stream of hot water. At last, something was working.  
  
The water was like an elixir on his grimy skin. The warm rain brushed the oily film from his skin and face, making him feel alive again, the drops running therapeutically though his slick blonde hair like a tingling massage and Johns eves fluttered shut at the relaxing sensation.-  
  
- Bang Bang Bang -  
  
Someone was at the door and tore John from his daze, leaving him feeling quite irritated.  
  
"Sod off!" He called over the roar of the shower. His room was filling rapidly with steam because the bathroom didn't have a door. The nuisance at the door tried the knob to find it was locked and John smiled mischievously, smugly aware of his own privacy and continued with his therapeutic shower-  
  
- But his heart stopped when he heard a jingling sound at the door, the sound of keys in the lock-  
  
"I'm not decent you moron!!!" He shouted throwing the shower curtain around his waste. The door opened just as John covered his shame and in lumbered a man with a white lab coat on, frighteningly tall and with his expression plain and revealed no secrets. that was until his searching blue gaze found John naked in the shower with a seething and somewhat shocked look on his guise. All he did though was raise an eyebrow but it lowered again, back to the mans original state of mind.  
  
"Did I catch you at a bad time?" He said, purposefully stating the obvious. John just stood, his mouth dropped open and face wrinkled in disgust.  
  
"Who the hell do you think you are?!" Demanded John in revulsion "What kind of moron goes walking in on guys in the shower?!?" The unnaturally calm man just looked blankly at him.  
  
"I'm your boss, Mr Howe." And he smiled. John felt sick his with disbelief. Still smiling in delight for shocking his future fellow researcher, John's new boss smirked and leant forward to formally shake him by the hand. Still dumbstruck and slightly unable to comprehend his situation, John complied and fumbled with the curtain, trying to shake his bosses hand and maintain his modesty at the same time. He only managed one of these, and that was to shake his bosses hand.  
  
The other man didn't bother to avert his eyes and just watched as John's wrestling with the curtain became more desperate until finally the event that the man had been waiting for occurred; he slipped and fell with a heavy thud, pulling the shower curtain and most of the shower down with him.  
  
John's superior walked slowly over to the struggling mass of curtain, water and shower pipes and casually said. "I seem to have caught you at a bad time, Mr. Howe. I'll be back after nine." He turned and moved over to the door but stopped briefly to look back and say. "You should use the time to get yourself aquatinted with your surroundings and something to eat." He paused, unable to resist. "And some decent clothes."  
  
****  
  
R&R 


	2. Windows 95

Review: From: Blue Jackal ()  
  
Kind of lame considering that you posted only one chapter when nothing happens accept introductions.  
  
Repliy: I apolagise if I didn't state the obviouse in my last fic, but that was actually the intro chapter seeing as William introduced himself. I didn't want my characters to be nameless faces that would just run and scream from the monsters, also, a story can have tonnes of action in it, but if it is worded poorly then it can become boring. I've read chapters in stories where the main character is doing absolutely nothing, but the words can bring out their feelings perfectly.  
  
PS: Blue Jackel is an awful lot like White Tiger. . .  
  
Note to others: That Blue Jackel dude (Jackal is spelt wrong, b.t.w.) is some boy from school who has a problem with me, so don't worry about it, k?  
  
Disclaimer: I don't own Windows 95, k?  
  
***  
  
Angry, exhausted and increasingly famished John had been walking the mansion for what seemed like hours and had even unintentionally passed through the main hall four or five times, such was the labyrinth. Every room John entered, he winced at the gaudy yet somewhat colour-blind decor. The amount of times John opened the door and moaned out in disgust at the sight of puke-green wallpaper with gold trimmings. . . The glowing wall- lamps cast an eerie effect of entrapment in the squalid corridors making him feel he was slowly suffocating. . . like a rat trapped in a maze.. A maze that had an interior designer with a bad sense of humour.  
  
The main hall. It was much more beautiful than the rest of the manor . . . The chandlers . . . the gothic candles . . . it was as though it had been designed by a totally different man. You can imagine just how relieved he felt when he finally, after what felt like hours, found his way to the lab areas.  
  
"Thank God. . ." He muttered and leant against the icy grey steel walls. The air was much cooler down here than it was in the mansion and it didn't reek of that strange 'old building' smell. Instead, the musk of damp wallpaper and overheated electric lights was replaced by the overpowering stench of antiseptic. It made John's nostrils sting for a few seconds . . . From the catacombs of the facility came a strange and distant voice . . . what sounded like . . . swearing.  
  
John raised an eyebrow and pushed himself off the wall in the direction of the lamentation and after several seconds of wandering the labyrinth, he came across the door from which the noise was coming from and he pushed it slowly open.  
  
At a computer desk in an office was a young man who couldn't have been older than twenty-three or so. He was wearing a lab coat and a red bandanna through his mass of afro-like hair. . .The young man continued to complain.  
  
"You see all these hi-tech labs in the movies with lasers and holograms and shit, and what have WE got??" He smacked the monitor violently with one pale white hand. "FUCKING Windows 95!!"  
  
"Hitting it won't do it any good though." The guy in the chair shot around, his clear blue eyes glared at him with the fear of a small, startled animal.  
  
"Huh?? Wha???"  
  
"You were hitting the P.C. . . If it is messed up and the boss finds out you hit it, then weather or not you did the damage in the first place, you'll probably end up paying for it."  
  
He glared up at John for one or two seconds with his large watery eyes but then finally decided that John wasn't a threat to him.  
  
"Oh Uh. . . Thanks. . ." He tightened his bandanna maintaining that nervous expression, however.  
  
"So what's your name?" Asked John, attempting to break the ice.  
  
"My what?" From the expression on his face, John guessed that he didn't expect the question.  
  
"Name."  
  
"Uh. . . . Bill Rabbitson."  
  
"Well remembered." -  
  
- "But my friends call me Bunny!" He suddenly blurted out.  
  
"Okay. . . Bunny. . ." The nickname suited his energetic, anxious nature. . . -  
  
- something on Bill's lab coat caught Johns attention; a little 'Ban the Bomb' badge on his lab coat next to his name tag.  
  
"What's with that badge? Don't you think that's a little. . . tasteless?"  
  
"Huh? Uh, what's wrong with it?"  
  
"I mean, you're working in a bio weapons development facility and you're worried about the atom-bomb?"  
  
". . . I try not to think about that . . . " He seemed to be thinking for a few seconds. "Uh. . . Have you met the boss yet?"  
  
"Oh God, yeah. . ." Said John. "The guy's a freak! He opened the door when I was in the shower and didn't have the curtsey to leave!"  
  
"He's probably gay."  
  
" . . . You really think so?"  
  
"Yeah. . . I met him earlier. He gave me a map of the mansion. His eyes are really creepy."  
  
"Tell me about it. . ." Bill had really eased up in the few seconds the conversation had lasted. . .  
  
"He has that look about him that says 'boy hungry pervert'."  
  
"Then I'm glad I didn't go back to my room. He said he'd come back at nine." Bill looked at his watch. "It's ten forty. . ."  
  
"You think I'm going back in there right now??"  
  
"Hm." Bill nodded unhurriedly in agreement and fixed his attention back on the computer. "Could you give me a hand with this piece of shit??? It just won't DO anything!" John looked over Bill's shoulder. "Try hitting 'Control, 'Alt' and Delete'." Bill complied but nothing happened.  
  
"Now what???"  
  
"I don't know! That's all I got!" John gave the computer tower some rough slaps. "Some computer nerd told me that. I don't know how to work one!"  
  
"Great help you turned out to be!"  
  
"What the hell are you trying to do on this anyway?!"  
  
"I'm supposed to be working on this thing when the specimens arrive. I want to know how to work it BEFORE then!"  
  
"Why the hell did the boss put it up to you to work it if you CAN'T?!"  
  
"Why don't you ask the freak?!?!"  
  
-"Yes, why don't you ask me?" Both of them froze as a tall man leant over Bill's shoulders and punched a few commands into the consol. It was the same man who had made a fool of John earlier; his boss. He'd obviously been there eavesdropping on them for quite a while. . . . Twice now he had made John look like foolish child and it was starting to get to him. The pale skinned man's fingers danced across the keys gracefully and the screen came to life. Suddenly, the once seemingly primitive P.C turned a whole lot more hi-tech than it looked. . . "The CPU for this isn't supposed to come onto the market until 2005."  
  
"The what?"  
  
"Never mind. It just means that it can process a lot more info than your normal 'Windows 95'."  
  
"If you say so. . ." Murmured Bill, starting to get the hang of it now that it had been loaded all up. John was much more focused on the man himself than what he was doing to the P.C. The man had scarcely let up a single suggestion of an emotion entering his mind and was simply as relaxed as ever. . .  
  
As his inexpressive boss came to face him, John's eyes darted to his personnel tag and back, catching a glimpse of the name 'Birkin.' John had heard the name 'Dr. Birkin' once before but was told that it was the designation of one of the most gifted 'female 'employees working for Umbrella.  
  
-"If you would like to know my name, Mr Howe" Birkin said abruptly, driving a blistering bolt of surprise into heart. "Then all you need to do is ask me." John glared, surprised and startled at Birkin's smiling face for several moments before realizing he wanted him to actually ask him his name.  
  
"Uh. . . ."-  
  
-"William Birkin."  
  
John frowned. "I was always told 'Birkin' was a woman. . . ."  
  
"That must be my wife, Annette."  
  
"You mean you HAVE a wife??" Birkin scowled for the first time since John had met him. "Any reason why I shouldn't have one??"  
  
"No. . ."  
  
". . ." Birkin let that one go for now but John had clearly struck a nerve there as Dr. Birkin marched away in an angry huff without another word to either of them.  
  
"Think you got him mad. . ." Murmured Bill sheepishly.  
  
"Fuck. . . That's all I need. I haven't even started my first day of work and I've already pissed my boss off. . ." Bill pretended that he had nothing to do with anything and just kept on typing - though he didn't know what he WAS typing and was just trying to look busy so he didn't get pulled in with John and William's little disagreement. . . "Look - if you want me to go just say it!" And then he noticed he sounded just like that nauseating Dr. Birkin. "ARGH!!" And he stormed off, not realizing he had just done exactly was William had done before him.  
  
*** Notes: Bill Rabbitson is referring to the Resident Evil movie when John first encounters him. ^-^ R&R 


	3. Go Left!

Authors Notes: I thought this had to go without saying, but no flaming!! Argh! Anyhow, thanks to everyone who gave me nice reviews!! I haven't put another part on recently because I got that damn 'Blaster Worm' virus! Anyhow, it's all better now so I can continue. *Crowd Moans*  
  
*** "Go left. Left!! I SAID LEFT!!!"  
  
"I AM going left!!"  
  
"No I meant go MY left!!"  
  
"Oh for the love of God! I can't go back that way now!!"  
  
"Well it's you fault for not being able to tell left from right!!"  
  
"You were saying to go YOUR left! How am I supposed to know!?" John watched Bill thump his slim fingers down on the directional buttons on the keyboard with an increasing emotion within him that he couldn't quite work out. It was like someone had left a pressure cooker on inside him. . . His already boiling blood began to char his very bones as he watched that idiot Rabbitson fumble the keyboard and the character on the screen go bouncing around, flying off cliffs and diving into boiling lava.  
  
"Change into wolf form!!" One of the others researchers yelled at Bill. "It can't get you in wolf form!!!" John watched the small, poorly rendered wolf bounce from metal spike to metal spike like a pinball and an almighty roar of discontent rose from the spectators.  
  
"You moron!!! Change Back!! CHANGE BACK!!!"  
  
"I'm trying!!!!"  
  
-But suddenly the picture on the P.C screen disappeared-  
  
"WHAT DID YOU PRESS?!?!"  
  
"I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING!!!" Still sitting in the leathery wheelie chair, Bill checked around the P.C for loose cables but his eyes stopped dead in mild shock when they came to a pale damp hand that could only have belonged to one man.  
  
"This isn't play time, boys." William said in his calm, deep voice. DR. Birkin then folded him arms, his expression slightly disgruntled but this was barely discernable to the untrained eye. John however, was already finding the puzzle that was William Birkin highly addictive and was practicing reading the man's emotions at every opportunity yet Birkin was just to hard to work out, at least at such an early point in John's relationship with him. John couldn't tell weather Birkin was pretending to be displeased or weather he was trying to hide it, but if that was so, John had pretty much learnt already that Birkin wasn't the type to try something and fail at it, so what WAS going on inside that perverse head of his? What kind of-  
  
-"Why are you looking at me like that, Mr Howe?" Cut in William who had, in turn, been watching John gawp at him with a look of puzzlement of his face.  
  
John had been unexpectedly torn out of his musings and could only reply in gibberish. "Duh - I Uh -Well - It's!!"-  
  
-"Never mind. . ." William again cut in as he rolled his eyes. The other researcher who were still all huddled around the now blank computer screen hadn't moved or even breathed too heavily since William had discovered them, possibly out of fear of their jobs. "How long are you planning to stay like that?" William asked them, and guiltily, the small crowd of grown men slowly dispersed.  
  
"Back so soon?" Commented John, somewhat grumpy from lack of sleep. Birkin was odd. John had called him a freak and he took it like a joke but when he acted surprised when he found out he had a wife, Birkin went totally off the deep end, considering just how insignificant John's comment had been. . .  
  
"And what do you mean by that, Mr. Howe?" Birkin asked frowning slightly in an attempt to somehow ward John off of the line of conversation. John pretended he hadn't noticed.  
  
"You stormed off pretty huffy earlier and now you're back to normal just like that." William's frown deepened. "Why are you looking at me like that??" -  
  
-"Why did you sound so surprised when I told you I had a wife??"-  
  
-"I"-  
  
-"Do you suppose me so revolting???" -  
  
-"Actually"-  
  
-"Do you honestly believe I'm so unappealing to the weaker sex that I don't even have a wife???"-  
  
-". . ."  
  
". . ." William blew his fringe harshly out of his face with an angry puff and span around, disgusted by the sight of the man.  
  
". . . You know. . . I don't have a wife. . ." Muttered John, taken very aback but the outburst of emotion. "So. I guess that makes you more appealing to the chicks than me. . ." William turned back to John to seem him looking down at his hands, roughly playing with his fingers out of nervousness. William let himself smile but stopped when John glanced back up for his approval.  
  
". . ." William wasn't certain how to reply for a moment; it had been a while since someone had got him this speechless. . .  
  
The longer the silence went on for, the more John wished he would disappear suddenly and be free of this horrible feeling of emotional strangulation, that every part of his soul was in torture. William savoured the look on John's face, wanting to make him stew a bit for 'insulting' him through the use of his wife, weather he meant to or not.  
  
" I mean, I called you a freak back there and you didn't even batter an eyelid! If you tolerated that, then of course I didn't think you'd overreact over something tiny like that!" William laughed and shook his head. John had an opportunity to repair a very nasty situation with his boss and had just butchered it totally. John looked at him with utter shock and disgust as William choked down his chuckling. John just really couldn't work out that man! He had just unwittingly said something that should've drove him berserk but he was laughing! And heartily too!! John's jaw dropped." . . ! What the hell are you laughing at!?!" He yelled, furious with the man for treating his torn and beaten nerves like this. He should've just got pissed with him like a normal person! He probably could've handled it more. . . "God, I'm sick of this!" He threw up his hands and watched in disgust as Birkin cackled his head off, purposefully trying to rattle John even further. "It'll take more than that to freak me out, you moron!!" He called out to him just as Birkin left through the door. "Man, I hate him!" He muttered to himself, but then, looking up, he realized that everyone in the room was starting at him with wide eyes and large smirks. "Argh, Don't bother!" He growled.  
  
***  
  
Well, that may have seemed like a bit of a short and pointless chapter, but it's supposed to show you where William's emotional priorities are; not on himself, but on his wife. In other words, he sees comments made at himself as petty idiocy, but if it's directed at those he most cares about, that's when he really flips. 


	4. Trixie

Authors Notes: This chapters slightly longer than the last one.  
  
Ran out of things to say!  
  
***************************************  
  
"John! SHHHH!!!" Hissed Bill Rabbitson  
  
"Huh??" It was about four in the morning and John had just come down to the labs to grab a cup of coffee and had just run into Rabbitson, who was holding a large blue towel open and stalking toward something in the corner of the room.  
  
"Don't move!"  
  
"Bunny, what the hell are you"-  
  
- Suddenly, the thing that was in the corner let up an almighty screech and rushed past Rabbitson, knocking him flat, zoomed through the room and out the door that John had left open. It grazed John's left leg as it went past and left a slightly damp mark where it made contact.  
  
John's eyes were wide. He'd only caught a glimpse of IT yet couldn't work out what it indeed was. He saw images of it flash through his mind as he tired to make sense of what he saw; an exposed brain, three huge bone-like claws and a red disgusting mass that looked like a body only without skin. . . Rabbitson shoved John out the way and glanced left and right out the door.  
  
"Fuck!! You let it get away!!"  
  
"What WAS it??"  
  
"Trixie! Ah- I mean, a proto-type Re 3. William called it a 'Licker'"  
  
John thought to himself.   
  
"And now it's loose in the facility?? And you were trying to catch a bio- weapon with a TOWEL???"  
  
"Like I said, it's a proto-type." Explained Rabbitson. "Birkin said to me he made this model docile so it won't attack. I mean, if he's a good enough biochemist to make monsters impossibly viscous and spiteful, then I guess he can pretty much do the opposite for them if he wanted to. . ."  
  
"I suppose it makes sense. . .I mean, that way you can actually get close and study it without sedating it."  
  
"Wishful thinking." Rabbitson commented, pointing out the door. "It could be anywhere by now; those things can really move when they want to." Bill walked over to a desk and picked up a syringe and another towel. "Seeing as YOU let it free, YOU can help me find it. When you've got it under the towel, inject it with this, then page me." Bill handed John the stuff and he looked at it with weary eyes.  
  
"So I guess it responds to the name 'Trixie', then?" He asked, not feeling bothered to argue at this early hour.  
  
"Yeah. . . Dr. Birkin was calling it that when he entrusted it to me."  
  
"Great job you did, Bunny!"  
  
"Well he didn't give me a leash or any means to restrain it! It started to get a bit rowdy and started going all up the walls and on the ceiling, and when I tried to get it down with a broom handle, it cut it to pieces like it was paper! It then zoomed out the door and I chased it into this room."  
  
"Well, it seems to wanna get somewhere real bad. . ." John pondered to Bill. "If I were a monster with the mind of a puppy dog where would I go. . .?"  
  
"To your master?"  
  
"That sounds about right. . . So where's Birkin at?"  
  
"The helipad. He told me he was going there and that's why he left Trixie here."  
  
"What business has he got up there?"  
  
"You mean he didn't tell you??" John eyes narrowed.  
  
"Obviously not. I've been in bed since he yelled at me."  
  
"While the techs have been shipping the specimens in over the cover of night, Birkin took the researchers up to the heli-pad to meet his wife."  
  
". . .ARGH!!!"  
  
"Wha?"  
  
"Ever since all the business with my slip of the tongue over his wife he's been acting weird around me, and now he does THIS!!??"  
  
". . .?"  
  
"He's just doing it to single me out!!"  
  
"I think you're looking into this too much. . ."  
  
"The only reason you can't see it is because you're not involved in all this!!"  
  
Bill shook his head. "Whatever. . . Just at least pretend you're looking for Trixie, okay? And if you do meet Dr. Birkin at the helipad, tell him what happened."  
  
"Why don't YOU do it?? I'm not taking the blame!"  
  
"YOU let it out when I was about to catch it, remember??"  
  
"Oh yeah! Like you were about to catch it!! Since when have you ever completed a survival horror video game using only a blue towel!?"  
  
"Just go." Murmured Bill as he pushed past John and left the room equipped with his own towel and syringe of sedative. From somewhere in the facility, came scream of terror rendered barely audible by distance;  
  
"What the fucking hell is THAT?!?!?"  
  
"Sound's like it's really moving. . ." John commented aloud and made his way to the heli-pad. . . that was if he could remember where it was. . . Not that it was difficult to work it out however, a heli-pad was obviously on the roof but in a place like this, you could think you'd be heading for the roof and end up in totally the wrong place. . .  
  
***  
  
Bitterness proved to be indeed a powerful driving force, for John had found the helipad in record time, even before Trixie had but unsurprisingly, John had utterly forgot about the 'gentle' licker and knew only one thing;  
  
His thoughts raged in his mind. John was nearly at the heliport and according to is watch, it was four thirty two a.m and all the researchers but him and Bill were up on the helipad. Are all of them nuts?? All they were going to do was just be there to see William's wife arrive. It wasn't really worth going up there at four thirty in the morning in the freezing cold just to shake hands with some shrivelled old hag. . . Even if you didn't think it would give the best impressions to your boss, there would still be a great chance of oversleeping and John greatly doubted that they all would set their alarm clocks for this event.  
  
John wrapped the towel around himself when he opened the door to the helipad and was blasted with fresh, cold air. He began to wonder that if he didn't find Trixie just how well this sedative he had in his hand would work for his insomnia. . .  
  
John frowned sarcastically when he saw the ever-solemn expression on William's face; always unreadable and wholly irritating to someone who craved to understand his work partners like he did.  
  
John looked up and saw his fellow researchers standing in a stiff militaristic line, all of them looking either enormously uncomfortable, or extremely polite and understanding indeed, which was very unusual for the bunch of men he was looking at: Most of them quite possibly hook each others genitals up to car batteries in their spare time. . . And standing in front of the group of men was. . .-  
  
-John's eyes widened.-  
  
-Quite possibly one of the most beautiful women he'd ever seen.-  
  
Was he still thinking of the same William???  
  
The woman had blonde hair to her shoulders and dazzling blue eyes but strangely enough, she didn't once strike him on appearance as someone who embraced the stereotype of a 'dumb blonde'. Her face was fixed to a scowl, like Williams, but whereas his was a strange icy glare, his wife's was laced with a defiant and independent emotion John believed didn't fit all the criteria of hate.  
  
She was wearing a lab coat over her shoulders that was much too big for her; her husband had thrown it over her to protect her equally from the cold as from the lusty glares of his fellow researchers.  
  
"Pleased to meet you, Mrs Birkin!" Beamed one of them who John knew as the cigar-smoking 'Steve Keller'.  
  
"DOCTOR Birkin." She growled and moved onto the next man who was grinning like a true pervert. The man was Adam Falmer and John really didn't like the guy. Not only was he burly, but also he was as arrogant as hell and the look he gave William's wife made him shrivel in disgust. He murmured something in her ear and here beautiful blue eyes widened apparently as disgusted as he was. When William was conveniently not looking, she kicked that sick bastard Adam really hard in the shin and walked back to the side of her twisted husband. He pretended he couldn't see Adam hopping around in pain. Just then, William noticed John, as did his wife.  
  
"And who's THAT?" She mumbled, keeping her distance and looking him over discontentedly. John suddenly remembered he was still wearing that towel, and it was a PINK towel. . .  
  
"That's just Mr. Howe." He said with a faint smirk, undermining John's first impression he was making with his wife. "He's from the Chicago branch of Umbrella, that's all." But John wasn't going to let him get away with it that easily.  
  
"Your 'Licker' 'Trixie' has escaped after you left it unrestrained with Rabbitson, SIR." He said arrogantly, trying to deliver his blow as effectively. William raised his eyebrows, like John had just released a terrible evil.  
  
"William," Barked his wife. "What were you thinking to leave that creature unleashed with a guy who hasn't been working at the place for more than a week!?"  
  
"It's tame!!"  
  
"It's STILL a licker!! How can someone in your position act so irresponsibly?!"  
  
". . . I was just expressing a scientific point!"  
  
"Being???"  
  
John warned and as though he could hear it, William drooped his head and, looking up, said;  
  
"This is neither the time, nor the place, Annette. . ."  
  
"Fine." She grumbled and turned to the still present researchers. "Don't you have somewhere to be? We're not paying you by the hour, you know." The band of men suddenly didn't have a place to go, looking around at each other, dumbstruck, like they had been freed from a strange spell. "Well get going, then!" She barked clapping her hands as if she was scaring away a pack of mindless animals.  
  
The men pushed past John as they dispersed back into the facility.  
  
"The phrase 'beauty and the beast comes to mind." Scoffed one.  
  
"Yeah, and Annette's the beast." They all chuckled, except for John. William and Annette's eyes burned dangerously into the backs of the men but they didn't hear the comment, so they couldn't do anything about it. John pretended to follow them out but hid behind the door for what Annette had to say to William. John was finding the man so hard to figure out; was his wife Annette the key to understanding?  
  
"You really didn't have to belittle me in front of my employees like that." Said William frowning, yet smiling in a half-serious way.  
  
"Well now at least they know what's in for them."  
  
"So you were using me as an example?" -  
  
- From the depths of the facility came the voice of Bill Rabbitson  
  
"Here Trixie, Trixie, Trixie! Good girly! There's a nice girly! Now just let Uncy Rabbitson. . . - ow. Ow! OW! OW!!!! THAT HURT YOU BITCH!!!"  
  
"So it's tame, IS IT??" She yelled to her husband. "You'll get yourself fired!!"  
  
"She's just frightened!" He commented, and then sighed almost comically. " I supposed I'll go get the anti-virus. . ."  
  
"We're having to use it already. . ." she complained. "My God. . . Those researchers you've got here do everything BUT research!"  
  
William smiled slightly but got up to go get the anti-virus and John ducked behind the door.  
  
"Wait." Annette said suddenly. John was nearly dying of suspense already; he really didn't want to get caught behind the door by a passing Birkin but he just couldn't help but be so goddamn nosy and now his torment was being prolonged. "I'm in a foul mood as it is." She remarked, her voice weary from stress. " It's five in the morning and I hate helicopters and I just met the most disgusting band of researchers I've ever met and you've just brushed me off like a minor inconvenience. . ." William couldn't understand what she was getting at. ". . .Aren't you at least going to try and . cheer me up?" John's eyebrows rose. He knew what she was getting at, alright. . . but William. . .  
  
John cringed in absolute disbelief, feeling his guts writhe in embarrassment as William stepped up to his wife, grabbed her nose and honked it like she was a little kid.  
  
"Honk - honk."  
  
- WHAM!!!!-  
  
She drove her fist into his face and he fell like a ton of bricks onto the floor.  
  
Annette stomped past John with such fury he honestly feared for his safety. As she marched on she batted doors out of her way like they were made of paper; William had really pissed her off.  
  
William however, was still lying on the floor. John walked slowly over to the unmoving man and tapped him afew times with his boot.  
  
"Er. William?"  
  
William moaned.  
  
"Don't take this the wrong way or anything, but you really don't have any idea about women, do you?"  
  
"I was only messing around. . ." He whimpered.  
  
"Well she obviously wasn't. . ." John said as he inspected a strange white pebble on the floor next to William.-  
  
-but it was only on closer examination that he realized what that innocent white little pebble was.  
  
"Oh my God!!!! Is that your TOOTH????"  
  
********************************** The licker ties into the plot eventually. Honest! 


End file.
